


Sadness

by HGIndustrialis



Category: Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Healing, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, Mudstone Remix, Nonbinary Headcanon, Trans Kevin (WTNV), trans headcanon
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-30
Updated: 2021-01-28
Packaged: 2021-03-10 20:08:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,622
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28422960
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HGIndustrialis/pseuds/HGIndustrialis
Summary: Carlos has left the desert otherworld, also known as Desert Bluffs Too, making Kevin sad. Kevin does not like feeling sad. This is a story of healing mixed with some of my own lore about sadness, happiness, and the sentient heat of the Smiling God.
Relationships: Charles/Kevin (Welcome to Night Vale)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 8





	1. Big Feelings, Today

_I am sad, dear readers, and I do not like feeling... sad. It brings an intense sensation which I struggle to describe. This sensation... I can feel it behind my face, inside of my head, and across my skin. All the places on my body where I have been caressed by the love of the Smiling God~!_

_It is... unbearable._

_You know, my manager at StrexCorp used to call this weakness. The first time I was weak, she called me into her office, sat me down in the employee Compliance and Safety chair, and gently touched my cheek. It stayed a lovely shade of black for many days!_

_She said, "Kevin, do you know why I called you in here? Your hourly performance review has tanked. I don't think I've seen your **smile** in _two minutes _, Kevin. We are only as good as our bottom line. Don't be the bottom line, Kevin. We live in a healthy, competitive market. We are not afraid to make **cuts**."_

_She held my shoulder and gave me fifteen minutes of quality reassurance! It only sent me to the Health and Wellness department for three days. They just took me in and spilled the contents of my weak and fragile body **all** across my hospital gown, right there for me to see! With a little faith in hard work and four weeks of unpaid reconstitution labor, I was happy once again. I got my Smile back~! (◉‿◉)_

_I can be happy again. I can choose to be! I can choose that abrupt loss of control that hides just under the surface of us all!_

_So what if Carlos left?_  
_So what if Carlos returned to his... boyfriend... in that horrible place?_

_... I_

Kevin stopped writing and his smile faded to a sharp-toothed scowl. The sensation of sadness returned and not even the taste of blood in his mouth made it stop. _It's my own blood,_ Kevin realized, as if for the first time, and deepened his scowl into a frown. His fingers touched the warm stream that flowed from his wide nose. 

Sadness grew where the light of the Smiling God once filled him. He touched the swollen and sore flesh around the encrusted stitches across his forehead. He couldn't remember what they were for.

Sadness ripped across his shoulder where an ex-lover's serrated kiss still stood in a permanent raised and purple line of flesh. Sadness pulled tight across his chest where his own nails raked away his breasts. Sadness ground down his spine where his best friend liked to rub.

 _I miss him_ , Kevin wrote. _I miss happiness without delirium._

His eyes were physically incapable of crying and that, too, felt unbearably sad. He touched the rim of raised scars along their bottom edge. 

Something burned inside his ribs. Disgust rose from the sentient heat within him. He reread his work and physically recoiled. With a few keystrokes, he selected the entire word content of his document and slammed delete. His smile spread wryly across his face. Too wide.

Sadness was agony, he concluded. He itched to stop it. His fingers flexed. His feet ground a loose tooth left on the floor. Kevin inhaled deeply and chuckled lightly. With unsettling speed, he grabbed the notebook and tossed it with unearthly force against the adobe wall. It shattered to pieces, most of which landed in the blood that pooled at the low spot in the floor.

His wry smile became a grin that reached the black chasm of his eyes. The sentient heat swelled, fighting him for control of his hands, but Kevin only sighed. He waited for the tremors to recede.

"I made a promise," he said. "To a very dear friend." 

A knock at his home office door startled him. Beverly Ann, the nosiest neighbor, was already poking her head inside. 

"Oh, Beverly, how lovely to see you here~! ...In my home," Kevin sung sweetly.

She looked around and spotted the destroyed notebook. "Everything okay in here?" She asked, but didn't wait for an answer. "We got a new person in town, a theologian. Town's throwing him welcome." She paused thoughtfully. "You look absolutely horrifying, Kevin. Clean yourself up." And she was gone.


	2. Doubles

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kevin meets Carlos' double, Charles, and it goes unexpectedly well.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's a lot I did not like about the Mudstone Abyss, so this has become an au where none of it happened like that. I just took the enjoyable parts and did something else with them.

"--Kevin? Kevin!"

He stood outside in the unyielding sun surrounded by people; neighbors, former coworkers, and new faces that made up Desert Bluffs Too. They all looked at him with veneers of concern, annoyance, and irritation. The desert heat tingled his skin and the light pressed down on the crowd. Kevin smiled wide-- too wide, at first-- and said, "oh, wow, I'm so sorry, Lauren. I was _miles_ away!" He laughed and laughed, then Lauren laughed, and then the others laughed, too. Everyone laughed, and laughed, and laughed-- except the Night Vale transplants who stood petrified.

The moment ended. "It's nice to meet you, Char-" -- _his heart pounded in queer panic--_ "-les." Uh-oh, they were stunningly gorgeous and... somehow familiar. His panic became prismatic; aside from the asymmetrical haircut, and the interesting scar on their cheek, the person standing next to Lauren was undoubtedly Carlos' double. He inhaled, pushed up his dark sunglasses to make sure his eyes were hidden, and said, "I'm Kevin, He/They, and I'm sorry, what did you say your pronouns were?"

"He/They." Charles smiled delightfully and shook Kevin's hand, lingering a bit.

Kevin's heart skipped. "My, what an _amazing_ smile you have," he said because Charles' smile and lips and mouth and teeth were just so, so perfect. 

"Oh, I-- Thank you."

"You're _so_ welcome," Kevin said full-heartedly. "And _welcome_ to Desert Bluffs! What brings you to our little stretch of the delightful and terribly endless expanse?"

"You know, honestly? I just... really wanted to live here. I'm a theologist, I study the fascinating iterations of faith and the spiritual from what is still alive or has been lost. Desert Bluffs is one of the most theologically interesting places in the U.S. ...Well, after Pine Cliffs, but a town where everyone is a ghost is pretty hard to beat."

Kevin frowned for a _fraction_ of a second, just long enough for Lauren to catch, and for him to notice the way her face became strained when she did. "Yes, Desert Bluffs _is_ better than _most other places_ ," Kevin sang bitterly. 

The sun bore down on them and, just for a moment, Kevin felt deeply and terribly cold. He and Lauren exchanged eye contact and an unimaginable _rage_ shot into his head from somewhere outside of his body. He thought in a string of absolutely _malicious_ words, strong enough to feel quite... visceral.

The feeling disappeared when he looked back at Charles. "We are so happy to have you here, Charles. I would love to show you around town sometime! It's not much but it's ours," he hummed. "If you haven't been to the Sun'smile Dune, you really must."

"If you've got the time, I'm honored."

"So you are, Charles," Kevin grinned. " _And so you will be._ " He let that hang. "If there's anything you need, anything at all, don't ever hesitate to ask. Lauren will do anything to help you settle in."

Lauren said, "Oh, yes, though I am busy as the Mayor of our town--"

"-- But I'm _sure_ she would be _happy_ to make you a priority," Kevin finished for her. "Isn't that right?"

Lauren hesitated. "Yes, of course."

"That's very generous," Charles said, maybe to Kevin? But just as Kevin met his inquisitive gaze, one of the Desert Bluffs Welcome Organizers and a small group of her community folks came up from across the recreation grounds, urging Charles to break away and fix himself a plate. So he did, smiling once more at Kevin before he passed by.

Kevin whined. He turned and watched Charles walk to the other side of the sand lot. Unfortunately, that meant he was now alone in Lauren's presence, which is not how he wanted to spend any amount of time willingly.

"Well, I should try to see if there is anything left."

"Oh, I already prepared you a plate!" Lauren said with a smile. She retrieved a paper plate impressively out of her open purse and held it out to him. "In case you were tied up again."

Kevin hummed a warning sweetly.

"I mean indisposed," she corrected and held the plate out further. Cornbread, cayenne pork, and black-eyed peas.

Kevin hesitated. "Why thank you," he said cheerfully and, grabbing it from her, tried to scout the nearest trash can. When he spotted it, he sweetly told her, "Well I can't imagine anything worse than having to stand here next to you a moment longer. Goodbye, Lauren," and slipped away. He turned the plate over into the trash at the end of the serving table, but Charles was occupied by the other guests, and his smile faded.

He turned around and made his way to the town's one and only public restroom. Mercifully, it was empty.

He went to the sink and opened the hot tap all the way. The water was already warm. He splashed it over his face but within minutes it became hot enough to boil skin. The impulse to run it over his arm was... very strong. But he didn't and instead, chose sadness. He turned the water politely off.

The mirror on the wall in front of him startled him greatly. How did that get there? And he wasn't smiling. Why was it here? He saw himself now the way most people did: monstrous, horrifying, defective, and repulsive. He traced the darker raised scars from the lower socket of his eyes where they stood out around the rim of his sunglasses.

A figure appeared in the mirror behind him. A whole other person. And they watched him indecipherably, but it felt like judgment. Another person stepped into the mirror behind him. And another. His weakness now had an audience. Were they here to correct him? Were they going to harm him? Was there anything left to destroy, he wondered. Could he make them regret it, he wondered.

Kevin sent his fist into the mirror and fractured the glass into a large spider web crack. Carlos would have stayed if he had just done better, he thought. If he could _be_ better. His blood dripped down the reflective glass. He hadn't noticed that his knuckles broke through in places and the free shards cut into his skin.

"Hey, what are you doing," an accusatory voice called from the threshold. "You're in the wrong bathroom."

Kevin turned to them and tilted his head. "No," he said and lowered his arm. In an uncharacteristically low voice he said, "I'm not."

He emerged from the bathroom with bloodstains on his clothes, broken sunglasses, and a smile. He pocketed a few new loose teeth for decoration and, feeling _much_ better, tried to mingle with his fellow townsfolk. Trite conversation, while tedious, also made you friendlier and though none of them worked for Strex anymore, the habit to maintain your social standing proved a continued Desert Bluffs pass-time. Eventually, the disgust from former coworkers, grimaces from former Desert Bluffs residents, and fear and hate permeating the Night Vale residents wore him down.

The sand lot serving as the town square stretched out on the other side of a newly constructed road from Desert Bluff Too's now-historic First House; a bunk house that had kept Kevin, Carlos, and the scientists sheltered and able to block out the eternal sunlight during rest hours. And after the town expanded, Kevin rather _forcefully_ petitioned for the building to remain a bunkhouse for the wandering souls that still came in from the vast desert other world. Carlos had been pleased.

He left the cook out and followed the path that meandered between the enormous blooming cacti scattered throughout the desert behind this First House. It reminded him of Carlos; together, they had walked this path many times during the midnight sun. Carlos talked a lot about the effect of the eternal light on each plant, each animal, and his mind and body, and while Kevin found the subject matter boring, he did find it pleasant to listen.

When the town became "properly" established, Kevin chose the end of this path to place the welcome sign. 'Welcome to Desert Bluffs! Population: All Smiles.' It had meant to be a charming new start dedicated to his real core values, but he came upon the sign now and it just made him feel... sad and weak. He dropped his broken sunglasses in the sand beside it and wondered if he had ever really been happy. Nothing happened when he thought those thoughts, and that was unsettling.

Kevin stood there for maybe an hour, maybe two. He remembered Carlos talking about how the static sun made it difficult to measure the passage of time without instruments. He had told Carlos that was silly, you could tell the passage of time by the temperature of the air and the creeping dread that filled all of us the closer it got to the Black Out. Carlos had asked what the Black Out was, and that's the first time Kevin realized that not everyone was abruptly plucked from consciousness at exactly 01:52:48 every evening.

What Carlos never learned was that, to Kevin, the passage of time always felt unbearably slow. The how and the why did not matter to him because it was not a fact that could be changed. In hindsight, that had hands-down been the worst part about Night Vale in the... however long he had spent working there.

Kevin heard a noise like the screech of sunlight growing brighter. He briefly wished it was the devourer coming to release him. Instead, a red Honda CRV came from around the corner and inside it was Charles on his way home to the house he rented by Little Rick's. He watched Charles pass, but to his surprise, Charles saw him, smiled, and swung the car around. 

Intrigued, Kevin turned to him with a vibrant interest. His lips parted and he said, "Hello, Charles."

"Kevin," Charles said. "I was looking for you. Is that blood?"

Charles paused, then nodded with respect. He put on a real smooth face and said, "Can we start with dinner?" 

Kevin didn't understand. 

"...because... you were going to show me around town?"

Wait, was this really happening? Kevin grinned and didn't miss the beat again. "Yes," he said sweetly. "Yes I was, Charles, and dinner sounds absolutely perfect. Are you free, mmm, perhaps Saturday?"

"I might be," Charles said with a smile. 

"Can I see your phone?" Kevin hummed. Charles reached into the cup holder, unplugged the aux cable, and handed the cracked smartphone to him. He entered his number as a new contact and then handed the phone back. "Now you know where to reach me if you are. I would _love_ to see your _very_ winsome jawline sitting across from me at this restaurant that just opened up in town."

Charles positively glowed. "I will let you know," he enunciated. "Take care, Kevin. It was great to meet you." He swung the car around again and headed back down the road. Kevin watched him. Kevin watched him even after he was gone from sight.

He was afraid of moving from this spot because this feeling would melt away, but the longer he lingered, the more restless he grew. So he did, eventually, walk home. The feeling did melt away. And he needed to work, again, because he had not been working very much at all, which seemed like the simplest solution to this problem. He had a radio show to host. And right now, he felt like nothing without it.


End file.
